


Bound and Found

by SomethingSubtle



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Book 7: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Gen, One Shot, Restraints, canon mention of suicide, harrymort only if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-18
Updated: 2019-05-18
Packaged: 2020-03-07 11:49:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18872617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SomethingSubtle/pseuds/SomethingSubtle
Summary: After Harry reviews the memories from Snape, his friends interfere with his intention to meet his death in the forest





	Bound and Found

He knew he shouldn't be surprised to see Ron and Hermione waiting in front of the stone gargoyle. Ron’s eyes were still noticeably red. _He should still be grieving with his family,_ thought Harry with some guilt; he knew they followed him out of concern for his well being.

He felt like a ghost already, heart pounding its last beats and he would have liked to have wandered out to the forest alone but with his best friends right here...there was no abandoning them at this point.

“I'm a horcrux.”

The confession came out as a whisper. Harry knew he looked pale and shaken as he stepped out of the headmaster’s office. He was looking at his feet, shamed and unable to meet their eyes.

Hermione gasped faintly, her hand over her mouth. She looked slightly scandalized, as if her own clever brain betrayed her by not foreseeing this possibility. Ron merely looked like he’d barf up slugs once again.

With the time limit looming over their heads, the three friends stood there in silence for a minute before Harry said, “I have to go to him. It's the only way.”

There was a brief but heavy silence following this muttered statement. He was still looking at the ground however, so he never saw Hermione’s face harden with determination. Neither did he see her raise her wand to cast a spell. He merely collapsed to the ground after her whispered “Stupify” and knew no more. 

* * *

He was spelled conscious again in an unused classroom tied to an, admittedly, very comfortable chair. Hermione and Ron were standing in front of him. She looked determined but faintly teary eyed. Ron was glancing back and forth between his girlfriend and her captive looking wary and unsure.

Before he could fully regain his bearings and ask what the hell they were doing, Hermione launched into a speech about how going off to die was not the solution right now, that Nagini was still out there, how the castle was prepared for an invasion and there will be time for research about removing the horcrux from him later. She was crying by the end of it. Tears leaking down her face as she made each point logically.

Ron seemed unsurprised by all of these points and Harry assumed that she told him all this while he was stunned, probably to convince him she wasn’t a Death Eater in disguise.

When the lecture on “Why Harry Potter Should Not Commit Suicide” was over, he really had nothing to say. He knew he could never convince her that she was wrong. That there was no time left for books and research. He knew that he could never work up the wandless magic to escape on his own. So he just looked at her, bitter but stonily accepting this betrayal.

There was a sudden castle-shaking rumble. Maybe a giant caused a turret to collapse or a blasting hex blew out a wall. Either way, the commotion in the distance startled the trio and reminded Hermione and Ron that they were needed in the fight. Hermione and Ron looked at each other before looking back to Harry.

“We, er, have to go,” said Ron reluctantly. “I’m sorry, Harry, but we have to go fight.”

Hermione rushed forward and threw her arms around Harry’s seated body, still crying. “It’ll be alright, Harry, we’ll come back and untie you and then we’ll figure this out and then you won’t have to die.” She was breathless and shaking. Harry was still in shock that this was really happening. _Where they really going to abandon him? After all they had been through together?_

Then Hermione turned and practically sprinted through the door.

Ron started to follow her then turned back and said, somberly, “See you later, mate,” before continuing after his girlfriend and into battle.

* * *

Harry spent the next 10 minutes trying to wriggle out of the ropes and muttering “Relashio” and “Diffindo” with no results. Part of him was glad the conjured ropes were still in place since that meant that Hermione was still alive but with the sounds of raging battle still audible it was a small relief.

Then the door to the classroom opened slowly, the sounds getting louder briefly before Harry recognized who walked through the door. All the blood drained from his face and a faint shushing noise whispered in his ears.

Lord Voldemort strolled casually across the floor towards Harry, looking gleeful. It was a distinctly unsettling look on the snake-faced man. _Well, why shouldn't he be overjoyed,_ Harry thought, trying to ignore the throb of his scar, _His enemy is already tied up and ready for unimaginable torture and death._

The Dark Lord stopped a handful of feet away from Harry’s chair, smirking unpleasantly. “To whom do I have to thank and reward for this thoroughly unexpected gift.” His voice was soft and wispy and while the question was clearly rhetorical, there was no chance Harry was going to tell him that his friends did this.

“I am pleased to see,” he continued, “that your absence from the forest was not due to any cowardice on your part nor was it a lack of my understanding of your need to play the hero. You were merely...detained.”

Harry felt a pressure in his head, then. _Voldemort is trying to read my mind!_ He realized suddenly. It had been too long since he’d practiced shielding his mind and the Snape’s lessons had been disastrous anyway. There was nothing he could do but bear the assault and hope Voldemort managed to skip over his most recent revelation regarding his status of Horcrux.

Belatedly, Harry realized that thinking about Not Thinking About Being A Horcrux was probably counterproductive. With a final pulse of pain, Voldemort extracted himself from Harry’s thoughts. The gobsmacked look on the usually composed face was so startling to the teen, he had to fight back a laugh. He might be feeling a bit hysterical, he realized belatedly.

Voldemort suddenly composed himself with a scowl. “That traitor, Snape! I should resurrect him just to kill him again. He knew!” The Dark Lord started to pace and mutter. “Unless he betrayed me from the beginning. Could he have been a powerful enough Occlumens to fool even me?”

Harry opened his mouth to gloat on Snape’s behalf but at the last second he decided not to draw attention to himself.

Voldemort continued to pace but his whole attitude was becoming bigger and more wild. “If he was in league with Dumbledore, is this a false memory to trick me into keeping the boy alive? Does this weak, insignificant child have a plan? Dumbledore's plan! I should kill the boy now. But! If that memory is not fabricated, then I would be destroying a part of my own soul. How could I have not known what he is! ‘Mark him as an equal,’ it said. ...Equal.”

Voldemort spun and pinned Harry with his crimson eyes. The boy stopped fidgeting and trying to escape his bonds. He hadn’t really been paying attention to the crazed mutterings and now he felt he missed something important. His whole body went cold with terror. Voldemort was up to something.

“I don't have an equal.”


End file.
